


Are You Okay? (Your String Says You Aren't)

by Rellanka



Series: A Year Of Cloudy Skies [1]
Category: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Soulmate AU, String AU, outsider pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:02:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23578861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rellanka/pseuds/Rellanka
Summary: Aerith has always been able to see them. The strings that bind people together with those they're fated to love. Sometimes, she wishes she couldn't.Outsider POV of the Sephiroth/Cloud relationship. Could fit the Remake or FF7 canon, and some slight spoilers for both.
Relationships: Sephiroth/Cloud Strife
Series: A Year Of Cloudy Skies [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1697269
Comments: 8
Kudos: 434





	Are You Okay? (Your String Says You Aren't)

**Author's Note:**

> Last spoiler warning for slight reference to canonical major character death at the end of the fic for those of you just getting into the fandom.
> 
> Blink and you miss it reference to AerTi.

Aerith had been able to see the strings since she was a little girl. She had been so confused, when she was little; so curious as to why everyone had different-colored strings attached to them that never seemed to be caught in anything, not even other people’s strings! Because there were so many strings. _So many_. 

She used to make up games with herself about them, sometimes; a pink string meant that that person was feeling happy today. A red one meant that person was mad. A white one meant that person was busy. It wasn’t until her birth mother had sat her down one day and told her about this new gift that Aerith understood that the strings meant something else. Something more important and permanent for the people attached to them than she realized. That, except for Aerith and her mother, no one else was able to see them. It was another thing about her that was different, another thing that set her apart. Aerith both loved and hated her ability to see the strings. Just as she loved and hated all of her ‘special’ abilities. She'd raged about it for weeks inwardly- too afraid of revealing the new ability to show her anger outwardly. But eventually, she'd made peace with it. She'd even learned how to use it to her benefit, on some occasions.

It'd been years since that day. Aerith'd had over a decade of practice at seeing the strings, learning to detect their meanings without ever needing to talk to the string’s owner. She should probably be well prepared for any string by now. 

But, even then…. Cloud’s string gave her pause. 

It wasn’t… the first time that she’d seen a red-soulmate string tattered by betrayal. She lived in the slums where some people were willing to do just about anything to get out; she’d seen the results of betrayal before on the strings many, many times. It wasn’t even the first time that she’d seen a string darkened by tragedy. The slums were no guarantee of a happy ending, either, and she’d seen her fair share of those strings, too. It wasn’t even the first time that she’d seen a string with both aspects, as the two often went hand in hand.

But it was the depth of the betrayal, the sheer darkness of the tragedy that surprised her. For still being red, the string was tattered enough that in places it was the same thickness as the gossamer-thin white ones that symbolized lost chances. And the red- well, that was disturbing in itself. Some days it would be as dark as dried blood, a red so dark it was almost a deathly black. But most days, it would be just a little bit brighter- the exact color of fresh blood instead of old. With the way the string was tattered and fraying more by the day, it was the perfect color to make it seem as if the string itself were wounded and bleeding.

Aerith just didn’t understand. Didn’t know how it didn’t just bleed free of the color to become white, the sign that he and his soulmate would never truly love each other again. Didn’t know how it didn’t snap under the pressure, then fade away. Didn’t understand why it wouldn’t set them both free from a connection that had caused at least one of them so much pain. A broken string was a broken bond, and would leave Cloud and his soulmate connectionless. Contrary to popular belief, the strings and the bond they brought with them could break, Aerith knew, if placed under too much strain. And Cloud’s bond was under more strain than any other red string that Aerith had ever seen. 

What kind of link did Cloud have with his soulmate that his string was keeping its color, keeping its link, even with everything that had been done to it? How entangled with each other could he and his soulmate be that their strings would stand strong against things that would snap any other tie? How deep did their bond run that even in the face of so much pain, they were still drawn so completely to one another’s side? The depth and the breadth of it all, the overwhelming connection that they must have, took her breath away. In fear. It was chilling to think of what such a bond could be capable of. How capable the two people on each end of that string would be of influencing each other. She wouldn’t even put it past this particular string to draw the two bound back together even should one (or both) of them die. If the string didn’t break soon- Aerith wasn’t sure there would ever be anything capable of separating the ones tied together by its threads. 

Aerith shuddered and forced her eyes away from Cloud’s string before the others could notice her preoccupation, and her worry. She rubbed the red string connecting her to Tifa in a search for comfort as she tried to turn her mind away from the paths it’d been wondering down. 

She just didn’t understand Cloud’s string. 

And a part of her never wanted to. 

***

It’s not that she never asked Cloud about his string. She did ask. 

Once. 

“Cloud… you know that… I can see the strings, right?” She said softly, carefully, all too aware she’d just entered a minefield and needed to be careful where she stepped, lest she set off something she would regret for the rest of her life. 

Cloud tensed, drawing in on himself while at the same time trying to straighten himself up to make himself look taller, make himself look larger. It was obvious posturing, a defensive tactic that she’d seen him use before when he was hurting and didn’t want to show it. It made Aerith’s heart ache to be the cause of Cloud feeling like he needed to protect himself now. 

“Yeah.” Cloud bit out, tone cold and not inviting continuation of the conversation. He clearly knew where Aerith was going with this. Did he know already, then? Did he know who was on the other end of his string? 

“Your string-“ Aerith began before stopping abruptly, her words ripped from her throat as she caught the look in her friends eyes. She’d seen people suffer horrible wounds, she’d watched people die, and yet she’d never seen someone so devastated, someone experiencing so much anguish as Cloud was right in that instance. 

“Never mind.” Aerith managed to croak out through the lump in her throat and a throat gone dry as she did her best to hold back the tears that her friend wasn’t allowing himself to shed, “It was- nothing. Just me being nosy! C’mon, Tifa wanted us back before sunset. We’d better get a move on, huh?”

She never asked again. 

***

She **would** understand later, of course. She would see Sephiroth and Cloud together, would finally- _finally_ \- notice that Cloud’s string was also Sephiroth’s own. She would see them, see the yearning and belonging and love all twisted together and into themselves until those emotions were anything but positive. She would see Sephiroth’s loving possessiveness twisted into ownership, and Cloud’s willing submission twisted into forced compliance and bitter hate. 

She would see a wealth of positives turned negative, and know the danger that the world would be in should these two be forced apart. She would be a mostly silent observer as they were forced to clash instead of love, as the world around them was battered in the crossfire. Sephiroth so set in destroying the Planet that Cloud chose to love over Sephiroth, and Cloud equally determined to do anything he could to stop Sephiroth from hurting the people he cared for. And even with how they fought, the two forever being drawn back to one another. Again and again. The clashes never ending. 

If she could just help them somehow, help fix their bond so that Sephiroth wasn’t half-mad with imagined betrayal and Cloud wasn’t so angry from the many ways that Sephiroth had hurt him… if the two of them weren’t fighting, then the Calamity would be the only threat, and Sephiroth and Cloud fighting together would be able to stop **anything** , even Jenova. The alien that Sephiroth had used his greater will to control and used as a puppet. Jenova would have no chance if her son turned against her and fought by **Cloud’s** side. If Aerith could just…

But by that time she realized that, by the time she even thought to interfere, for Aerith…

It would be too late.


End file.
